


a silver lining, lone ranger riding

by ev0lution



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everybody Lives, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, Mutual Pining, RebelCaptain Appreciation Week, Semi Graphic Burns, alternatively titled: jyn and cassian are dumb and need to communicate, i didn't really write this for rebelcaptain week but it was happy timing, this fic cured my writer's block, use your words kids
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-12
Updated: 2018-07-12
Packaged: 2019-06-09 04:30:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15259494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ev0lution/pseuds/ev0lution
Summary: Jyn noticed the mark for the first time when she was six. She noticed the words that twisted around her wrist as she learned to read, and her mark was the first lesson in languages, and how they differed across the galaxy. Her parents taught her Basic, and the soldiers at her door taught her Sith, but the words on her wrist remained foreign to her.---Loosely inspired by RebelcaptainWeek 2018's prompts "believe" and "together".





	a silver lining, lone ranger riding

Jyn noticed the mark for the first time when she was six. She noticed the words that twisted around her wrist as she learned to read, and her mark was the first lesson in languages, and how they differed across the galaxy. Her parents taught her basic, and the soldiers at her door taught her Sith, but the words on her wrist remained foreign to her.

Of course, it wasn’t _really_ the first time she’d noticed the marks. She’d always been aware of them, just like she’d always been aware of her toes and her bellybutton and her green eyes. But it was like she’d taken one of her father’s microscopes to all the crevices in her hand; all the lines and squiggles were something she’d always noticed and known, but never really thought about. At six, the lines and squiggles took on a new definition; they _meant_ something, even if she couldn’t grasp their surface translation.

On Coruscant, it was popular to wear wrist guards. They came in all fashions and styles, but the Imperial officers had regulated black bands as part of their uniforms, hanging like cuffs off the wrists of every Imperial and sympathizer on the planet. Stormtroopers had their marks removed, with sharp needles and shiny robots, leaving black blocks behind.

On Lah’mu, Lyra and Galen burned their cuffs. They always wore their left sleeves rolled to the elbow, words proudly on display. Lyra’s was the question, and Galen’s was the answer. _Who are you? My name is Lyra_.

Lyra and Galen would be considered lucky. What an easy puzzle to solve, even written in Basic. Sentients across the galaxy went their whole lives without solving the mysteries in their skin, reading the words or planets they would never see, or even hear of.

“You may find them someday,” Lyra told her when she asked. Jyn stared at the strange letters while Lyra braided back her hair. “But you don’t need them. On your own, you are whole.”

Galen explained that the marks were not a second half, but a compliment. A partner, if that was what she wanted.

After the brief interest, lasting more than a week, they faded back into her arm. They were just a part of her body, like her hand or her knee or collarbone. They existed and nothing more.

///

When he was six, his marks appeared. This was occasion for a party on Fest, with music and dancing, enough to drown out the sound of shelling from outside. Somewhere across the universe, the Force had delivered a being, and that being would be an ally. A friend. A comrade. The marks around Cassian’s wrist were in Basic, but the last Basic-speaker in his village had died a few months ago in a raid. Cassian would have to wait to learn what they meant.

The night they appeared, his mother told him about his grandmother, and how her marks disappeared when she was just a teenager during a brutal storm. His mother told him about Festian traditions that he had already witnessed; a candle would be lit, and set out in the snow. The entire village would keep it burning all night, no matter how cold. It would guide the spirit back home, where it could rest. Then the mark was considered honored, though mourning would last far longer.

Before he understood that it was just tradition on Fest, and not one shared by the entire universe, Cassian took some comfort in the fact. Whoever wore his words on their wrist would mourn him, even if they hadn’t met. He thought about it every time there was another bombing raid, and his mother would tuck him under the kitchen table. He thought about it when the marks on his mother’s wrist faded one night, and they knew his father was never coming home. He thought about it when he clawed himself from the wreckage of his house, and he thought about it when Draven found him, curled and shivering in the snow.

///

When she was fourteen, Jyn was at the peak of her recklessness. She was brash and angry and still naïve enough to preen at every half-compliment Saw gave her. She was still naïve enough to work to please Saw, and not herself, first. She was even still naïve enough to put stock in her marks, when one of the Partisans caught a glimpse and smiled with rotting teeth.

“Those fairy tales will get you killed, girl,” he said, leering down on her. He was massive and carried a blaster the size of her body, but Jyn didn’t care. He was still new. The new Partisan, the one who would die just a week later, said, “Those damn marks make your weak spot a mile wide. All someone has to do is read you those letters.”

The double insult – being called a child, being called _weak_ – was enough for her to find the bottle and a quiet hall off the hangar. It didn’t stay quiet, however, because she was still fourteen, and she was still flesh and bone, no matter how much she wanted to be made of durasteel. Jyn screamed as the acid bubbled over her skin, but it was like Saw always said: _pain is the price of stupidity._

She nearly blacked out from the pain. Jyn fell to the floor, the bottle shattering, and she was so focused on the way her skin was thrashing that she didn’t notice she’d missed a spot, right at the base of her palm. She ended up keeping it, as a vicious reminder.

Jyn wasn’t wearing her usual cuff when she later met with Saw. She’d rolled her left sleeve up, just like her parents used to, but for an entirely different reason.

She’d expected Saw to be proud. She’d expected a nod, or maybe an approving hand on her shoulder. Instead, he looked disappointed. That stung worse than the acid, and so Jyn stayed away for three whole days, and when she did return, it was with sharp teeth. Saw said nothing about it, and all that acid caught in the first crack of their relationship.

///

When he was fourteen, he told his first lie to Draven. It rocked him so profoundly that he didn’t pull off another for more than a decade.

Cassian had performed every step that Draven had outlined for him, except for the very last. He made the appointment, he arrived ten minutes early, and he even wore the suggested short-sleeve shirt, to make the operation easier. But he watched the needle touch the wrist of the boy beside him, and he experienced something he hadn’t for years: he lost his nerve.

“It’s gone, sir,” Cassian told Draven, the white bandage around his wrist hiding not a scar, but the very words he was supposed to have removed. They were perfectly preserved, and well-hidden.   Draven nodded, then asked him about his surveillance of Imperial chatter, and Cassian was off to rattling facts, conveying only the most important information.

The Alliance taught him how to read Basic when he first enlisted; the language was the first thing the Alliance passed on to him, taught in conjunction with his physical training classes. His mark was in Basic. The words themselves were vague, but he grew attached. Whenever someone so much as said a number, he felt himself tense, zeroing in on the conversation. He couldn’t stop it, so he worked hard to cover his tell instead. Everything had been taken from him, but for these words. Everything was gone, except for the person that would speak them. He’d hold on like a lifeline.

 _Fifteen years ago_.

He kept them tucked to his chest. They were the one thing he wouldn’t give up for the rebellion.

///

When she was sixteen, she watched three old women crack oracle bones over a fire. She was a fresh wound, tinged with poison.

Through smoke, the old women told her about love. They told her that those who loved her were in pain over recent decisions. They told her she would fall in love with a man who was good and who would be kind to her. Jyn replied that they were a pack of frauds, and she took back the credits they stole from her while they were cracking bones and making smoke.

Jyn didn’t give a shit about love. She didn’t believe in kindness. She wanted to know about the Man in White.

///

When he was sixteen, Cassian murdered a man for the first time. Not a Stormtrooper, not an Imperial, because those lives didn’t count when you were a rebel. They didn’t have names or families, only genocidal jobs that had to be stopped. Those were just uniforms. Those were just monsters.

But when Cassian was sixteen, he looked an informant in the eye and shot him. He looked a man in the eye whose name was Tagge Driess, who had a wife and two daughters, whose father was killed by the Imperials, and he shot him in the face. It was the first time he’d seen the life drain from someone’s eyes. He didn’t sleep for three days.

///

When she was twenty-one, she was hauled in by the Alliance. It was very different than being arrested by the Imperials; she wasn’t forced into an anti-toxicity shower, for one, and she wasn’t kept chained and starved for three days to test her strength. The Alliance just threw her by her throat into the back of a ship, and it wasn’t the worst way she’d been arrested.

But the Alliance checked her wrist, just as the Imperials did. At least, when the pockmarked Alliance recruit logging her information caught sight of it, he didn’t make a crude remarked. He flinched when he saw the bubbled, stretched skin, bruised and further battered from her time in prison, and too long in cuffs. The young recruit looked horrified. It almost made her smile.

///

“Fifteen years ago,” replied the criminal, the convict, the Imperial monster’s daughter.

Cassian felt himself freeze, at twenty-six, words burning on his wrist. It was like having his face shoved in an icy lake. For a moment, he couldn’t think or breathe.

But she hadn’t so much as blinked at him, though he’d spoken first. She couldn’t read his words, maybe. They were probably in Festian. Maybe they were a mystery to her.

His eyes flicked down to her wrists, unable to stop the tell, and he found his answer. Her skin was a horror scene, a wreckage of bumps and crevices and sick-looking bruises. Someone had burned it away. She didn’t know her own words because they’d been taken from her.

It all raced through his mind in a second, and then he was back on interrogation autopilot, hard and intimidating. But he couldn’t help the touch of surprise at the way her voice went gentle around her father’s death wish, and hard again at the mention of Guerrra’s name. Was it the work of the Partisans? Did they take her marks from her? Or was it Imperial?

When he allowed himself to consider the marks on his wrist, he’d always assumed it would be a rebel. He always thought it would be someone on base, maybe a recruit to Intelligence, maybe a pilot. Someone like-minded, someone he could trust. He thought it would be a _rebel_. Not anyone like the filthy, angry criminal in front of him, no one like this razor for a prisoner, who looked ready to strange him.

But the universe had a sense of humor. The next words out of her mouth were sharp and venomous, like the last nail in his coffin. “I rebel.”

///

Jyn Erso, daughter of Lyra and Galen, Rebel, Partisan, victor, grifter, and thief, was twenty-one, and somehow still alive.

She clutched Cassian’s hand like a damn deliverance, sitting uncomfortably straight in the metal chair, staring at the puckered skin around her own wrist. She wouldn’t lift the bandage around Cassian’s wrist, which the nurse had told her was there for privacy, and nothing else. She’d heard whispers, in her short time on base, of a cleaning gone wrong (and what a _strange_ word that was, _cleaning_ , for what they’d done). Just because she rebelled in the discomfort her mutilated wrist caused, didn’t mean Cassian would.

(Did that make them a match, in some twisted way?)

She stomped down that thought, and focused on the other bandages wrapped across his chest and hooking around his rattled spine. They protected the baby-soft skin that always resulted from too-much bacta.

He was going to be okay. She had the word of four different medical professionals, and she couldn’t believe any of them. She scarcely dared to hope that she could.

“Jyn?”

Her eyes shot up, taking in his battered face. His wide, foggy eyes were blinking slowly at her, pupils blown wide as they tried to push past the drugs. She surged up on her toes, dropping probably too heavily on his chest, tucking her chin into his neck.

It was a shock for both of them. Cassian was having trouble believe they were alive, and that Jyn was there, in his arms; Jyn was having trouble believe she was actually touching someone, that this was what it felt like. She’d forgotten, after spending so long keeping her distance.

“Are we?” He couldn’t finish the question, taking heavy steps through the watery fog in his head. Jyn understood him anyways, and spoke straight into his neck.

“Alive,” she said, “Safe. On rebel base.”

“The others?” Cassian asked. His voice was sandpaper, rough and gritty, but it felt like cool water on a burn. Jyn held on a little tighter.

“Alive. Safe.”

Cassian’s arms wrapped around her then, and Jyn felt rather than heard the groan he suppressed. She was about to loosen to grip and step back, to get a hold of herself while Saw’s voice in her head called her a _foolish girl_. But Cassian’s arms wouldn’t let her, and she felt him turn his face into her hair, taking a deep, shuddering breath before exhaling her name. She thought of the wrist pressed against her spine and wondered if Cassian’s letters were gone, or mangled, or still there. Something twisted in her. She knew what she wanted them to say, if they were.

///

The longer Cassian knew Jyn, the more those words on his wrist made sense.

She was so brave, braver than anyone he ever knew. She defied all his earliest judgements, and proved to be uncommonly kind. She showed compassion in her own secretive, roundabout ways. She would refuse any plan that put civilian lives in danger, and she would risk her neck to save some random farmer’s life before sacrificing it for the mission.

What he had taken for solemnness and broodiness was actually contemplation. She possessed an introversion that Cassian, after a long mission, appreciated more than anyone. But when he liked to sit in comfortable silence with her, while he liked that they could just _be_ with one another without consequence or expectations – he never wanted to stop _talking_ to her. He always wanted to know what she was thinking. He always wanted to hear whatever sharp insult she had ready, he always wanted to know what clever contribution she had in mind for their next mission. He wanted her opinion on everything, from the latest raid to the sludge of the cafeteria. He wanted to talk to her every day for the rest of his life.

It was why, when he found her speaking to Chirrut in the mess, he sat down eagerly and kept silent, so he could hear what Jyn was saying.

“I think it’d be nice,” she said, her fingers moving over Chirrut’s wrist. She knocked her knee against Cassian’s in acknowledgement when he sat beside her, and it sent a happy little shot to his heart. She glanced up at him and then back down at Chirrut’s wrist, indicating what her hand was touching.

It took Cassian a moment to catch the dots threading around Chirrut’s wrist. They were the same colour as Chirrut’s wrist, so they were harder to see. Cassian had always assumed Chirrut didn’t have the marks at all. Baze always wore a cuff.

It was impolite to bring up mismatched pairs; Cassian remembered it being less taboo on Fest than it seemed to be on base. He’d discovered that the hard way at thirteen, after inquiring after the difference between Draven’s empty wrist and the wrist of a man he’d seen hanging around Draven’s quarters, who had bold cursive still around his arm.

But now, Cassian watched Chirrut’s wrist, and realized that maybe it wasn’t a mismatch after all.

“You can hardly see them,” Jyn said, finger still brushing over the raised bumps. “It’s more private that way.”

“This is the first language I learned to read,” Chirrut said, “And it’s exceedingly uncommon, except for in the Jedhan temples.” Chirrut held out his hand, “May I feel yours?”

Jyn cracked an almost-smile, the one she wore when she thought of a particularly foul joke. She held out her brutalized wrist anyways and watched Chirrut’s face as it went dark.

“Acid?” He asked quietly, after running his fingers around her wrist. Cassian clenched his hands into fists to stop his twitching fingers.

“Common stuff,” Jyn replied evenly, eyes on her scars. “Found in any hangar.”

Cassian’s mind jumped to a list, running through all the corrosive acids he kept on the U-Wing, puzzling which one could be responsible. It didn’t matter, he decided. He’d get rid of it all.

“Saw?” The question dropped from Cassian’s mouth before he could stop it. He wasn’t quite ready for the sudden weight of her eyes, pinning him in his seat. He dropped his own eyes back down to her wrist, and found another punch to the gut. Chirrut had turned her wrist over, exposing the only smooth patch, and the only word that had survived the acid. The word was enough, but the language was enough of a slap on its own; Cassian hadn’t seen or read Festian in years.

“Saw did not do this to his Partisans,” Chirrut said, hands still skimming her wrist. “Not the Partisans who frequented the temple, at least.”

“No,” Jyn said, that vicious half-smile back. Cassian used to think it was smug, before he finally recognized it for what it was: a defense mechanism. He braced himself, but nothing could’ve prepared him for her next words, “I did it.”

Jyn took her hand back and flexed her fingers, eyes on the way it distorted the scars further. “It was in some other language, something other than Basic. I couldn’t read it. Either way, it was a weakness. I couldn’t afford any weaknesses.”

Cassian’s heart sunk, but he kept his face blank. Casually, he slid his own hand into his lap. Her words sealed the deal. He would never tell her.

///

Jyn etched out a groove in the rebellion, finding a slot for herself. The rest of Rogue One helped tremendously, but Cassian stood out. It was probably because of the hyphen. Jyn was observant, far more so than people usually thought. She noticed the way that Cassian was initially know as Captain Andor on base, without a single person addressing him casually on base. People would nod at him in the halls, they would avoid eye contact, they would move out of his way. Jyn suspected only Kay used his given name, but that had kept Cassian intimidating, since Kay was a seven-foot Imperial droid whose voicebox was permanently set to shout.

But a couple months after Scarif, she started to hear it. It wasn’t _Captain Andor_ addressed in briefings; it was _Captain,_ in formal settings, and _Andor_ in informal. It was a transitionary phase that soon ended, and was replaced with the hyphen. It wasn’t _Captain Andor_ that would take the South entrance, it was _the-Captain-and-Lieutenant_ , no names needed, since that may as well have been their title. Outside of briefings, it went further. It wasn’t _Captain Andor_ that hijacked the ship, it was _Cassian-and-Jyn_. It wasn’t _the-Captain-and-Lieutenant_ that were toasted upon entrance to the base’s bar, it was _Cassian-and-Jyn_. New recruits talking about Rogue One’s story would always talk about the moments at the tower as joint, their movements as one; Pathfinders detailing their movements in training exercises as Cassian-and-Jyn; their names were always entwined in mission reports, in debriefs, and official documents, Cassian-and-Jyn, Cassian-and-Jyn, Cassian-and-Jyn.

It popped up within their little found family as well. Bodhi would ask for Cassian-and-Jyn when he had a question about the U-Wing. Chirrut would check the training rooms for Cassian-and-Jyn late at night, when the Force decided they needed some wisdom. Baze looked for Cassian-and-Jyn for his caf in the morning, which they would snag for him early when it was still fresh. Even Kay, after a month, found himself tacking Jyn’s name on with Cassian’s, as much as he found it distasteful (as he often told Jyn).

It was no wonder, Jyn thought, as she sat stretched out on Cassian’s bed one night. She was seated shoulder to shoulder with him on his bed, their backs against the wall and their feet hanging off the side. They were scrolling through endless briefings, keeping one another awake. It was no wonder they were so linked because it wasn’t the first time their night had ended like this, reading until their eyes were too dry to keep open. She found herself hoping he’d offer his room to her, too exhausted to drag her feet back to her room. He’d offered to share her before, and she’d taken him up on it enough for it to be comfortable.

But if he didn’t offer, Jyn thought as she glanced up at him again, it wasn’t entirely bad. It meant she would still open her door the next morning to watch him melt out of the shadows wordlessly, knowing better than to talk to her before her first cup of caf.

“The markings on his wrist read _I’m going to miss my ship_ ,” Cassian read, snapping her out of her thoughts. She glanced up at him. “Maybe we could find their owner’s.”

It made Jyn sad sometimes, to be right. The marks were nothing but a weakness. The acid had been reckless, but it’d been the right choice. Maybe in another time, in another galaxy… but no. Here, they were dangerous.

Sometimes, she watched the remaining word on her wrist, and wondered at the question it posed. She was half-surprised by their owner’s continued existence. Surely, anyone made to compliment her should be dead now. But maybe they were like her: good at survival.

Cassian was looking down at her datapad, where a photo of their mark took up half the screen. Jyn’s eyes dropped to it as she took in every detail, committing the Imperial officer’s face to memory. This photo was a few standard years old, but it was the newest the Alliance could come up with.

“We should turn in. We won’t memorize anything else tonight,” Cassian said after a moment. “It’s late. You’re welcome to stay.”

He avoided her eye when he offered, still bashful over it. Jyn nodded, shoving her hands through her hair, trying to convey that it wasn’t a big deal. This was so normal, her heart was thumping in her chest. Because that was totally normal.

“I’ll stay,” she said, clicking her datapad off. “Thank you.”

They shuffled around one another in silence, taking turns in the fresher before they both curled up on Cassian’s bed. Jyn relaxed her shoulders back until they bumped into Cassian’s chest. The bed was small enough that it was nearly impossible to avoid touching. Soon, Cassian’s arm landed around her waist, carefully pulling her closer. Jyn shut her eyes, landing her hand on Cassian’s unmarked wrist.

She thought about his mark, which she still hadn’t read. It sent a spike of anxiety through her – what if their owner appeared? What if they meant something to him? What if he wanted something to do with them, what if…

Her hand tightened unconsciously, and Cassian’s hand twisted, twining their fingers together. She thought of the hyphen, and wished she wasn’t only brave in the dark.

///

Jyn had never liked Luke Skywalker’s Threepio, and it didn’t take an Intelligence agent to see it. The sound of his stiff joints always made her grit her teeth, and the glint of gold off his plates made her walk in the other direction. Cassian didn’t blame her. He would also want to dismantle the droid if it brought up his dead Imperial father every time they spoke. It wasn't his own father being brought up, but he sort of wanted to do it anyways.

_The memory of your theft of the Death Star plans will most definitely obscure the memory of its creator, your father._

_It really is unfortunate that you were incapacitated during the destruction of the Death Star, as many rebels would’ve appreciated your reaction as positive propaganda._

_It is excellent news that your heroics suggest very little comparison to be drawn between yourself and your father._

Disdain for the droid was something Jyn and Kay agreed on, though Cassian increasingly suspected Kay’s dislike had more to do with loyalty to Jyn than Kay’s own annoyance at Threepio’s antics. Kay and Jyn got along a lot more than they let on, their friendship ever-growing since Jyn commandeered a new body for him while Cassian was still in the medbay. It wasn’t uncommon for Cassian to walk in on them cleaning their blasters in companionable silence (both blasters having been stolen from Cassian by Jyn). It was becoming ordinary to find them hanging around the U-Wing, amicably poking fun at each other as they worked on something.

This newfound loyalty explained why, when Cassian saw Threepio stopping Jyn in the hangar, Kay appeared suddenly at her side like a large, protective shadow. Cassian, who had been headed for a nearby X-Wing and its pilot, Shara Bey, changed course to move swiftly towards them. While their friendship was something that made Cassian very happy, he also knew they were both inclined to violence. Together, they increased the likelihood of both committing said violence by ten. He had seen firsthand their usual tactics for a common enemy. It was impressive, but not something he wanted to unfold on base.

Cassian reached earshot, and the words that buzzed out of Threepio’s mouth almost set him to a sprint. “If you are unaware of the origin of the word on your wrist, I am fluent in over six million forms of communication – “

“Were you inputted with that data before or after you were captured by Jawa scavengers?” Kay interrupted loudly, before Jyn could even ask. If it was in Kay’s protocols to roll his eyes, Cassian was sure he’d do it.

Artoo appeared, never straying far from Threepio, and whistled something that sounded like a threat. Jyn’s response came before Cassian could reach them, an equally shrill whistle through a smiling mouth. Whatever Artoo had said was sure to be vulgar, and vulgarities coming from friends always made Jyn smile. Cassian would never forget the laugh he’d startled out of her, the first time he’d said _fuck_ in front of her. Cassian wasn’t normally one to swear in Basic, preferring the knives of his native language, but that one had slipped out, and the bells that had rang from Jyn’s throat had caused more slips since.

It was a little ironic that Jyn couldn’t read the words on her arm because she picked up languages faster than anyone Cassian knew. She could pass through some dozen languages, and was fluent in at least four. She understood binary without thinking (something Cassian had always struggled with, explaining his extra care in ensuring Kay’s linguistic capabilities included Basic _and_ Festian), and could even speak some of it, but that was mostly vulgarities conveyed in whistles and squeals. The first time she’d peeled back her teeth and screeched at Artoo, Cassian had nearly jumped out of his skin in surprise.

Jyn learned languages a notch below lightspeed, picking up enough Shyriiwook from Chewbacca to carry a simple conversation. She was working on speaking it now, making Cassian smile whenever he heard her clumsy growls, which were usually followed by Chewbacca’s roaring laughter.

Whatever Artoo had said had derailed the conversation, as Kay replied, “My calculations indicate that your likelihood of being dismantled increases with every phrase uttered. You shiny amalgamation of waste materials.”

A tame insult by most measures, but coming from Kay, it was nearly roguish. Kay usually preferred statistical analysis in his arsenal. It was clearly Jyn’s influence, to get him to call Threepio garbage.

“Alright,” Cassian said, finally reaching them. His hand landed on Jyn’s shoulder. “Break it up, all of you.”

Artoo whistled something Cassian didn’t quite catch, and Jyn smiled, sharp and happy. She touched his side briefly.

“Yes, Captain,” she said, completely oblivious to the way her words sent heat to pool in his stomach. She turned and headed into their ship, knuckling into his side once more first.

Threepio turned to shuffle away, scolding Artoo for escalating “the KX-series security droid”, which he reminded Artoo was initially programmed by Imperials, “and certainly had the circuitry to prove it”. Artoo let out a happy screech in return, apparently exhilarated.

“Though you have previously accused me of being indiscreet, I believe I have successfully diverted Jyn’s attention,” Kay’s loud proclamation drew his attention, and even startled him.

Cassian would’ve sputtered, if he wasn’t a seasoned spy. “That was a distraction for Jyn?”

“Of course,” Kay said. “You have not yet informed Jyn of the meaning of her mark, which links the two of you by the moment of your first words to one another. She is ignorant that the language is Festian, which is your first language, and you have yet to correct her.” Cassian glanced over his shoulder, but the door to the ship was closed, and there was little chance of Jyn overhearing. Kay had probably found the statistical probability of her eavesdropping low enough to have this discussion. “Reason stands, however, that while you have not told her yet, you will tell her yourself in the future, and most likely do not want it to come from anyone else.”

Cassian looked back at his friend, his shoulders relaxing a little. “Reason says that?”

“The term ‘reason’ here acts as a shorthand descriptor for my analysis of the statistical probability, based off other times in which you have told Jyn difficult truths. You prefer it to be private and it to come from yourself,” Kay responded. Then he shook his head. “You have previously asked me to speak in more colloquial terms to promote better understanding and save time, yet you misunderstand when I do. It would be far more concise if we were to revert to our previous method of discussion.”

Cassian smiled, “It was just a suggestion, Kay.” He reached out and patted Kay’s elbow. “Thank you, Kay.”

Kay paused, then nodded. They both followed Jyn into the ship.

///

Of all people to bring it up, Han Solo was the one. Even Chirrut had only broached the subject by mistake, not knowing his hands would find the wrecked skin of wrist, and not the slight raised groove that used to belong to her mark. But she should’ve know Han would be the one to ignore taboo and question her. Solo was either the stupidest or bravest person Jyn had me. She'd run a few missions with him, and had a nasty feeling it was an unhealthy mixture of the two.

“He really that bad, sweetheart?”

She didn’t catch what he was referring to at first, until he shot his eyes down on her wrist, which was unusually bare. Saw would say she was growing idiotic levels of comfortable in the Alliance if she felt safe enough to roll up her sleeves while working on the Falcon, shirking her usual piles of jackets and long sleeves. She, Chewie, and Han had been tasked with organizing the crates of bacta they’d liberated from an Imperial stronghold the day before. Between the stuffy ship and the labour, Jyn had stripped the layers unthinkingly, a behaviour that would’ve been akin to hurtling herself into space when she was a teen.

Jyn snorted, shoving her crate into place before turning and leaning on it. “It was a better option than wearing a disgusting wristband twenty-four hours a day,” she indicated the wrap around his wrist, which had started their work as tight, but was now loosening enough to give Jyn a peek. _Some rescue_ , the piece she could read said. “Beats the Princess’ metal cuffs, too. Those just look painful.”

Han snapped his head at her for the insinuation, but Jyn just shrugged with an almost-smile before she bent for another crate. She shelved it beside the other.

“Now, listen here, kid,” he snapped, whipping out the _finger_ that all the Pathfinders liked to mock, since he was always wagging it like a grumpy old man. Jyn straightened and watched it jab towards her. “This is nobody’s business, but mine.”

Jyn smiled as Chewie returned from counting bacta in the front. “Han Solo, old romantic. Who knew.”

Literally everyone, but she wasn’t about to say that. Even love-starved Jyn Erso could spot those puppy eyes from across the room.

Chewie laughed in response, and Jyn’s decent grasp of Shyriiwook was enough to understand that he was agreeing with her.

“Traitor,” Han replied, making Jyn laugh as Chewie let out another delighted growl.

 _Some rescue_. It wasn’t a hard leap to make, not with the story of Leia’s daring escape running across base as rampantly as the story of Rogue One, maybe even more so. Stories of daring rescues were far more exciting to tell in bars than stories of heartbreaking tragedy, even when they ended with hope.

Jyn shook her head with a smile and returned to their work, picking up the datapad to check off another batch accounted for.

“You’re pretty smarmy for someone too afraid to even try,” Han said with a faux-nonchalance, but Jyn didn’t even bother glancing at him. The bait for pride may have worked a few months ago, but nearly dying put certain things into perspective. Han’s next probe was more successful. “I know what language that it.”

There was another reason she hadn’t gotten another bottle of acid when she realized she missed a spot, another reason beyond vicious sensibility. There was a small part of her – the same part that remembered her parents’ fingers tangling casually, the same part that remembered gentle forehead kisses and goodnight stories – that was curious, and maybe even a little hopeful.

Jyn looked at Han finally, keeping her face clear of emotion. “Yeah? I always thought it was Oly Corellisi.”

Han snorted. “Not even close, sister.”

Chewie growled something, and Jyn had a harder time translating it. Something about care? Caution? Chewie was cautioning one of them? Against what, she couldn’t understand.

“What is it, then?” Jyn asked. Han smiled and shook his head.

“Nice try,” he said, “But since you don’t care… I don’t see any point in sharing.”

Just then, the door slid open, permitting Cassian. Jyn shivered at the rush of cold air.

“Captain Solo, I think Princess Organa is looking for you,” Cassian said. He picked up the pile that was Jyn’s jacket and handed it off to her wordlessly, turning back to Han. Jyn drew the jacket around her like a cape gratefully, the door’s delay in shutting letting in more cold air.

“She was upset about something that happened in the weaponry?” Cassian said.

Han turned, stomping to the exit, “I _told_ her, that was not _my_ fault!”

They watched Han blunder off with Chewie at his heels, roaring an apology. Cassian turned back to her, nearly smiling, “The hangar is due for a show.”

It was Jyn’s turn to snort. She could just see Leia now, rounding on Han for whatever mess that he, admittedly, probably did have a hand in causing. Han wouldn’t help his case, probably riled up and riding high off it.

“What were you talking about?” Cassian asked. Jyn lifted her wrist, displaying the word on her wrist.

“Han said he knew what language this is,” she told him. “But he wouldn’t tell me, so he’s probably full of it.”

“You don’t know what it means?” Cassian asked, sounding cautious. Jyn shook her head. After a moment, he said, “Do you want to know what language it is?”

“I don’t know,” Jyn replied honestly, looking down on it. “I’m curious, but I’m not dying to know.”

Cassian nodded, and she expected something further from him. But then he said, “We should probably go make sure Han and Leia aren’t going to kill each other.”

Jyn blinked, a little surprised at the topic change. She nodded anyways, picking up the rest of her layers and following after him.

Cassian had never asked about her marks, apart from when he stumbled in on her speaking with Chirrut. He’d always been very respectful of maintaining a distance from them. Sometimes, people were too pushy about it, barging in and asking before they so much as knew your name. But Cassian was almost hyper-respectful; always clear to be attentive if she wanted to talk, but never directly asking.

She wondered if maybe he knew the language. Maybe he thought it wasn’t his place.

 _Maybe,_ said a hopeful little voice in her head – and it was a big maybe – but maybe he didn’t want to think about her mark. Maybe it was like what she thought about his marks; maybe he didn’t want to think about them, because he had other hopes for their relationship.

But that was a big maybe.

///

His heart was pounding, and he had just turned twenty-seven.

Cassian expected the day to pass like any other, hardly registering himself that it was his birthday. Birthdays were celebrations on Fest, but not as important as Mark Days, when words either appeared or faded.

His first clue that something was different was from Kay, who wished him a very blocky “Happy Birthday”. It had startled Cassian, had him skidding to a stop. Kay continued walking, only to turn and blink his eye-lights at him.

“Have I fumbled the ritual?” Kay asked, point-blank. Cassian shook his head, watching Kay suspiciously.

“You’ve never wished me happy birthday before,” Cassian said. Kay had always had his birthdate, which was within the file he knew Kay had compiled of him. He’d known Kay for nearly a decade. New behaviour was not common.

“I have recently been informed of the custom,” Kay told him, then continued ahead, refusing to give anything else.

The next hint came at breakfast, when a pair of new gloves appeared in his chair, while Baze knitted silently across the table. Then one of the scrap-metal sculptures Bodhi was fond of making, formed into a U-Wing, that Cassian set on the small desk in his room. Then Chirrut clapped him on the shoulder, and told him that wisdom was the best gift of all.

“Is that my gift?” Cassian asked teasingly. Chirrut shook his head, smiling.

“The gift is this,” Chirrut said before tapping Cassian’s covered wrist. “Words on skin do not a soulmate make. The heart is far cleverer.”

Cassian knit his eyebrows, about to take that in the wrong direction, before Chirrut clarified.

“You don’t have to listen to this,” Chirrut said, tapping Cassian’s wrist again. “Listen to this,” he tapped Cassian’s chest, just over his heart. Then he glided off – probably to leave someone else just as puzzled and blushing.

He had been on the way to his room when Chirrut had caught him, and he was so wrapped up in his head that he jumped when he saw Jyn leaned against his door, waiting for him. Cassian could count the times he’d been startled on one hand since he finished his spy training. In one day, he doubled the number.

“You could let yourself in,” Cassian told her once he’d shook the surprise. He’d asked to meet her earlier to review some briefings, he shouldn’t be surprised at her presence. “I know you can slice these locks.”

Jyn shrugged, looking like she’d been caught at something. She mumbled, “I didn’t want to intrude.”

Of all the gifts he’d received that day, bashful Jyn was the best of them. He watched her face go red and curled his fingers into fists before releasing them. “You’re always welcome in my quarters, Jyn.” She went redder, nodding with her eyes glued to his shoes.

He opened the door and let her walk past, waving the door shut behind him. Jyn sat on the edge of his bed and tugged off her boots. Cassian joined her, taking the spot next to her and unlacing his own shoes carefully. He took off his coat too, navigating the sleeves made too tight by the layers beneath before shedding one more thermal layer, not really paying attention to it. Jyn finished first, sliding back on the bed to the wall, and giving her time to produce a blaster from wherever she’d hidden it.

“Happy Birthday,” she said clumsily, holding the blaster out a moment after she should’ve staring hard at the metal.

Cassian smiled at her, reaching for the blaster. It was a nice one, all the pieces polished and new enough that they wouldn’t malfunction. It was leagues better than either of the blasters that Jyn had stolen from him. He tested it for weight, bouncing it a little in his hand, then looked back at Jyn.

“To replace the one I stole,” she said quickly. That made his smile widen; he knew that she was still in possession of that particular blaster, because it was currently sitting on the holster she’d abandoned with her jacket. She could’ve returned the old blaster to him, and kept this one – which she had obviously gone to a lot of trouble to get – for herself. But Jyn wasn’t like that; she was uncommonly kind, and every small display of it had his heart pounding.

Jyn mistook his silence. She drew her legs up, as if to protect herself form whatever judgement she was imagining. “I haven’t celebrated a birthday in a long time, I’m sorry, it’s not good enough – “

Then Cassian laid his hand over hers, squeezing it quickly. “Thank you, Jyn.”

He wanted to tell her how this was the first birthday he’d had since he was six, wanted to tell her how much he appreciated it, wanted to tell her that he wanted to know about every birthday she’d ever had, wanted to ask her what she wanted for her own birthday, which was just two standard months away, and he wanted to tell her that she was a large part of the reason that he was thinking farther than a week ahead, that he was imagining things he wanted beyond that, and, though it felt blasphemous, wanted beyond the rebellion –

But Jyn was suddenly silent, frozen like a Loth-cat caught in a headlight. She was staring down at his hand. Cassian knew what she was seeing before he looked down too.

His wristband had shifted, somehow, and looking back up at then were the words he’d striven to keep hidden. He tried to pray that Jyn couldn’t place them, reaching desperately to his half-forgotten Festian gods – but she was still frozen.

She remembered.

Jyn was very, very quiet. When Jyn usually went quiet, she wasn’t _really_ silent _._ Cassian could watch her contemplate something in silence for hours; she was never quite still, never _really_ closed. Her face would change minutely, fingers tapping with whatever calculation she was making, drifting to her necklace when she needed help.

But now, she was completely still, completely silent. Cassian’s heart pounded.

“It’s nothing,” he heard his own voice and felt oddly jarred by it. His mind jumped to her history of always running, constantly running, _please don’t run, please_ – “It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter at all, don’t worry about it. Don’t think about it. I don’t want it to mean anything.”

Jyn didn’t say a word. She just nodded and Cassian lifted his hand suddenly, like it’d been burned by the same acid Jyn had dumped over her own skin.

They reviewed the briefing for ten stilted, awkward minutes before Jyn excused herself.

Cassian had just turned twenty-seven, and his heart was pounding.

///

Cassian rose early, as he always did, the next morning. He dressed, skipped shaving for the third day in a row, and went to wait outside Jyn’s door. Just as he always did.

He’d prepared a speech. Not a speech – he didn’t like that word. It sounded like something he’d think up for a mission, where he had to lie. But he desperately did not want to lie. He wouldn’t, not again. _Not_ to Jyn.

He was prepared for anger. He was prepared for hurt. Worst of all, he was prepared for an empty room. He wasn’t prepared for Jyn to step out of her room and mumble her usual exhausted-sounding _good morning_. He wasn’t prepared for Jyn to fall in step beside him, elbows brushing. Same as always.

Cassian could’ve flown with relief. She didn’t hate him. She was still _here_. He could convince her to stay, if he was careful.

(Another part of him surged with disappointment; she didn’t want to talk about it, she didn’t want to _try_.)

They took their usual seat in the mess, gathering caf for themselves, as well as an extra cup for Baze. The quiet between them was usually comfortable, but today it made him itch. He watched his cup, and Jyn out of the corner of his eye. She was blinking blearily into her caf, just as always. Once she had a full cup of caf in her, she seemed to brighten, asking him casually what he’d planned for the day.

“I could use some help on the U-Wing, after lunch,” he told her carefully, poking at his breakfast. He still watched her from the corner of his eye, watching for twitches or tapping, anything to suggest she was about to bolt. “I want to fix the doors before we ship out next week, and Bodhi is booked on the simulator all day.”

Jyn nodded, gathering the last of her breakfast sludge on her spoon. Every morning, she took a little bit of everything the cafeteria had to offer, mixing it into a sludge that looked incredibly unappetizing to Cassian. But he’d never starved. The last thing Jyn was was picky, especially when it came to food. She’d once joked that she’d gone too much without food to complain about anything edible, but she’d been wearing that gruesome half-smile, and it had sent a shot of protectiveness through Cassian.

“Sure,” Jyn said, “I need to run down to the weaponry for the mission, but it shouldn’t take me long. I’ll come straight after.” Cassian nodded, keeping a close eye on her. She wasn’t squirming, or trying to leave. Maybe he hadn’t scared her off, after all.

///

There was a pit in her stomach, as deep as Cassian’s fall on Scairf. She felt nauseous and couldn’t shake it, dread raking over her entire body. But she was more than proficient at hiding such feelings, after years with Saw. Showing so much as a sliver of weakness meant running suicides with Saw for hours, until the only thing she could feel was the raggedness of her own breath, and the sweat soaking through her shirt. She knew better than to show it.

Cassian left breakfast early – he had a meeting, and seemed eager to get there (a nasty voice snapped in her head _eager to get away from you_ ). So that meant she was alone when Baze reached the table, the bench sinking under his weight as he took the seat across from her. He sipped his coffee in silence.

She had the right idea when she destroyed her mark. She’d decided that last night when she returned to her room, shaking and unsure why. Destroying that mark was probably the best thing she’d ever done, _including_ Scarif. Everyone should do it. Better yet, whatever force-forsaken entity that decided it would mark every sentient in the galaxy should just stop. There was no use for them, they only made things dangerous. Jyn would happily help that entity along by planting a nice bullet shot in its head.

Cassian didn’t want it to mean anything. Well, good, they were on the same page. That’s what she’d wanted, when she’d thrown acid on herself. She wanted it to be meaningless. And here was her – her – her _whatever_ (she’d never used the S-word, and she wouldn’t now). Well, her _whatever_ was there, and he wanted the same thing. Take that, Force.

“What’s the matter?”

Jyn’s eyes jumped up to Baze, where he was watching her with something like apprehension. Like he’d wished Chirrut was there to stumble on this mess, rather than him. But Chirrut and Bodhi were working with recruits that morning, and wouldn’t be at breakfast at all.

Jyn shook her head. Cassian hadn’t detected anything was wrong, how would Baze? She loved him, but he wasn’t the most emotionally in-tune member of their band of misfits. Jyn had a feeling that sometimes, it wasn’t entirely a consequence of ability, but rather preference.

“Cassian left breakfast early,” Baze said finally, as if he was going to baby step his way into it. Instead of letting her take the leap, he shoved her off the cliff. “You haven’t said a thing about it, when you’re usually following each other around like lost puppies. What’s the matter, Jyn?”

Jyn bristled a little at being called a lost puppy. But it evaporated quickly with his question. It was so odd, but the way he said _Jyn_ reminded her so painfully of her mother that she spoke. She turned her wrist over and looked at the word written there. “It’s Festian,” she said.

It meant _time_. Once she’d figured out its origin, finding a translator on her datapad was easy. It was just as easy to remember what Cassian had said to her that day, because every second of it was burned onto her brain. She didn’t need a damn mark to remind her. _When was the last time you were in contact with your father?_

Baze nodded. “It is.”

“Cassian doesn’t want anything to do with it.” She couldn’t voice the other words, the worse ones stuck in her teeth, like trying to chew a Hutt. _Cassian doesn’t want anything to do with me_.

Baze took a sip of his coffee. He said, “Do you know how Chirrut and I became partners?”

Jyn stayed quiet and shook her head. Baze rarely referred to himself and Chirrut outright as together, though Chirrut reminded them of it often. It was even rarer to hear an anecdote from Baze. She could understand wanting to keep something private, to keep it between the only people it concerned the most. It was why she was fidgeting in her seat. But she didn’t say anything; she knew to keep her mouth shut, whenever Baze offered her a gift like this.

“I was very young when Chirrut came to the temple. Three years younger than you are now. I was also very foolish then. Though Chirrut was even more foolish,” Baze was quick to add, enough to make her smile a little.

“I was…” Baze glanced around and said, very quietly, “Smitten. Chirrut was far more charming when he was younger, and I was clumsy. Always trying to impress him, either during training, or with my knowledge of the temple. I was… quite hopeless, actually.”

Jyn’s heart clenched a little, imagining Baze as a teenager, tripping over himself to impress Chirrut. Baze was a professional at minimizing. When he said smitten, Jyn saw a Baze that was cross-eyed in love.

“But it seemed to me that Chirrut didn’t return my affections. A few weeks after he arrived, we were assigned to work on some restorations to one of the smaller temples. I was about to give up, when Chirrut told some of the other boys that we were going on our first date.” Baze shook his head, taking a drink of his coffee and looking like he wished it was something stronger. “Chirrut was under the impression that he had asked me out, when he asked if I would help him with the restorations. I was under the impression that was an assignment, not a question. Who knows what would have happened if I hadn’t heard those boys gossiping?”

Baze’s face darkened, for a moment, as if imagining a disastrous ending in place of what had happened. Jyn doubted that it would’ve kept them apart forever. She knew that fate worked in funny ways sometimes.

“The point is that communication is very important, Jyn,” he said, after loudly clearing his throat. “And that Chirrut is not nearly as smooth as he thinks.”

Jyn could see Chirrut, young and full of himself, thinking he was so slick for asking out a huge, bashful Baze.

“What did Cassian say,” Baze asked, “Exactly?”

Jyn was able to repeat his exact words. She’d only thought about them all night, hearing them over and over again. At first, she’d hoped to find a new meaning. After, it was about self-deprication.

“He doesn’t want you to worry about it,” Baze said thoughtfully, “He doesn’t want it to matter.” He took a thoughtful drink of his coffee, and said, “And why did you burn off your mark?”

“It was a weakness,” Jyn said automatically. She thought for a moment, then, “I didn’t want it to matter.”

Oh. Jyn let that sink in for a moment, staring down into her coffee. Baze gave her a moment before he nodded sagely and said, “Perhaps Cassian was really just speaking about the mark, and not the meaning you took.”

Jyn sighed, looking at the fingers wrapped around her cup. Of course he was right. And Chirrut liked to joke that he had enough wisdom for the two of them. Quietly, she said, “Thank you, big brother.”

Baze smiled a little, and nodded. “You’re welcome, little sister.”

Baze’s words had not only dissolved the pit, but stoked a hearth. She felt hope flickering like hot coals in her belly, warm and dangerous. Before the rebellion, hope had only brought her pain. But a lot of things had changed since then. And that was before Cassian taught her what hope really was.

The thought of him startled her a little and sent her heart pattering. Well. She was really going to do this. It was the same patter that had thumped through her at first when he crossed her in the hangar and said _welcome home_. It was the same kind of patter she got when he asked her to stay in the rebellion.

They sat in companionable silence for a few moments longer before Baze spoke again.

“Do not tell that story to anyone else,” Baze said. Jyn smiled.

///

Jyn tugged her sleeves over her hands as she stepped onto the U-Wing, glancing around cautiously for Cassian. She promised herself that she wouldn’t be a coward. It was just Cassian. They’d nearly died together. It took more than what she was going to say to rock their relationship. (She hoped).

Cassian stepped out of the cockpit, giving her a smile, “I’m just working in here, if you want – “

“Can I talk to you?”

Cassian paused. Jyn watched him swallow, nervousness suddenly washing over his features. She reminded herself that it was a good thing to see his nervousness. She knew how natural it was for him to go blank; how engrained it was to shut off his emotions from others, to close up completely. But seeing nervousness meant he was making an effort to show it to her.

He nodded and Jyn did too, but mimicking him made all the words fly right out of her head. She steeled herself. She’d faced down the monster from her nightmares; she’d taken down entire platoons of Stormtroopers; she’d signed up for a suicide mission without a second thought. But faced with any kind of _emotion_ , especially one that wasn’t sharp, like anger. One that left her vulnerable… she needed to sit down.

“Are you okay, Jyn?” Cassian asked, looking like he wanted to sit beside her on the bench she’d sunken onto. But something in her face held him back at the last moment. The result was that he swayed forward on his toes, like a jumper second guessing his leap.

“It’s about what you said.”

Cassian went white. “Jyn, I’m so sorry – “

“I’m not happy about it,” she said, barrelling on. She needed him to let her get it out before he made a judgement. Like she had. Cassian went quiet, looking like he was bracing himself. Jyn nearly lost her nerve, staring down at her knees. But she was Jyn Erso, and she’d survived far too much to falter yet.

“I’m not happy about it, because I _want_ the mark to mean something.” She thought about it, then shook her head. “But I also don’t give a shit about the mark. I mean, I give a shit about _you_ , Cassian, and I just want – “

What _did_ she want? She sighed and rolled her shoulders, like she was about to step into the illegal fighting ring that had kept her fed and bruised when she was seventeen. But this was felt a lot more dangerous than any of those fights had.

“I mean – I like that I know when I open my door in the morning, you’ll be waiting. And I like that when I need to blow off some steam and spar, even if it’s the middle of the night, you’ll join me. No questions asked.” She shoved her hand into her hair, just for something to do with it, then dropped it back in her lap. Her voice, which had risen, dropped just below her usual volume. “I like that even though you don’t ask for an explanation, I want to give you one. I want to talk to you about it, whatever happened. I like that I always want to talk to you.”

Cassian was quiet. Jyn stared at her knees, and then to her wrist resting on her thigh. She could see a little bit of his word poking out from under her shirt, suddenly more striking than any of the gruesome scars surrounding it.

“I want to tell you everything,” Cassian said, and Jyn waited for a _but_. “I wake up earlier every day because it means I get to see you sooner. And my favourite part of every mission we have is the ride back, because I get to talk to you all the way back. Just us, no distractions. My entire view of the rebellion has shifted since you joined it, for the better. I didn’t really understand hope until I met you.”

Jyn looked up at him. Part of her, the one Saw had nurtured, wanted to bolt. The other part wanted those words tattooed on her damn arm.

Cassian had shifted closer. He was within a foot of her. If she stood up, they’d be nose to nose.

Jyn stood up.

“I’m not good at this,” Jyn admitted, staring at his mouth. How hadn’t she been staring at it this entire time? His lips looked smooth. She licked her own chapped ones.

“Neither am I,” Cassian said, his hand lifting and hovering for a moment, before it landed on her cheek. “But I want to try.”

Jyn reached up and snuck one finger under his wristband, pressing into the groove of her words. She pressed up on her toes and met him in the middle.

///

Rumors rippled across base about why Andor – previously _Captain Andor_ , and then Captain, and now just Andor – stopped wearing his wristband. Marks were hard things to read in the first place, and Hoth necessitated long sleeves at all times, even in the rooms with the best heating, so they were still a mystery. No one really knew what they said. But rumors still spun on their sudden appearance, no more than a flash, up his sleeve.

Some attributed it towards his newfound cordial attitude – not exactly friendly, still not quite approachable, but no longer scary. Before Scarif, he was widely respected. Men followed him off into battle without a thought. Since, it was like a knot had loosened in him. Men would still follow him into battle, but they would also buy him a drink, and shuffle over to make room for him at their table.

Most attributed it towards Jyn Erso, but for different reasons. The first explanation was their competitiveness; anyone who saw them on the mats knew how hard they fought to win, even in friendly sparring matches. Maybe Cassian’s newfound boldness surrounding his mark was bore of Jyn’s. Burns as brutal as hers weren’t common, not even in the rebellion, and Jyn wore hers with pride. Maybe Cassian ditched the wristband to compete with her.

There were other whispers too, but these were whispers that stopped abruptly when one of them walked into a room, and they were usually accompanied by short anecdotes and raised eyebrows. _She was wearing his jacket_ or _he was outside her room again_ or _they were in the gym past midnight_ or _she hasn’t been back to her room in days_. Cassian may have relaxed, and Jyn might no longer walk around with knives for teeth, but they were still intimidating heroes of the rebellion. _Those_ kinds of rumors were kept under the table, if not from Jyn and Cassian’s ears completely.

Whatever the rumors were, they missed the way that Jyn had changed too, probably because the rebellion had seen so little of the Before-Jyn, the one from before Scarif, the one they’d dragged out of prison with claws thrashing. The rumors missed the change of Jyn’s display of her scars, from violent warning to proud possession.

That was what Jyn thought about as Bodhi relayed the latest rumor to Rogue One in the mess, telling them how there was suspicion that Cassian’s were in a language he couldn’t translate. Jyn snorted out loud at the irony, and Cassian’s hand landed on her thigh under the table, squeezing softly.

Cassian shook his head, “These rumors are becoming increasingly ridiculous.”

“So you _can_ read them?”

Jyn was sure her eyes must’ve jumped to Bodhi at the same moment as Cassian’s, because Bodhi’s smile crept slowly onto his face. _Gotcha_. “Don’t worry,” Bodhi said, “I won’t tell.”

Kay swung his massive head towards Bodhi. “Are you referencing the fact that Jyn and Cassian have recently begun fornicating? I myself thought this was rather obvious, especially due to their sudden increase in physical contact, which previously was already unusually high – “

“ _Kay_!” Cassian sounded so scandalized that Jyn burst out laughing, dropping her head to his shoulder. The rest of Rogue One joined in, aside from Kay, who swung his head between them, probably trying to puzzle out their funny little brains. Chirrut’s eyes were twinkling and Baze’s chest was rumbling. Jyn caught Baze’s eye and smiled. He inclined his head to her, tipping his glass towards her.

Jyn turned her head up at Cassian, and his expression was replaced with something soft. Softer than he usually allowed when there were others around. The remaining word on her wrist burned.

Jyn Erso was twenty-one, and she was in love.

**Author's Note:**

> I have a PhD in jumping to conclusions, so writing this was a breeze.
> 
> Comments? Questions? Critiques? Wanna feed my ego? I'm on [tumblr](http://clytemnestrad.tumblr.com/).


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